Pope Francis kicked out of the Roman Catholic Church Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the former ambassador from the Holy See to the United States, who had been found guilty of schism, or an irreparable separation from the Church, the BBC reports. Viganò served in Washington from 2011 to 2016.
An ultra-conservative, Viganò refused to recognize any of the liberal policies of Pope Francis and denied the legitimacy of all liturgical and policy changes made by the Vatican after the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s.
Viganò had been in hiding since 2018 when he accused the Pope of covering up sexual abuse by an archbishop. He has since grabbed on to various global conspiracies, including the illegitimacy of Pope Francis, posting on social media last month, “I repudiate, reject, and condemn the scandals, errors, and heresies of Jorge Mario Bergoglio,” referring to Pope Francis by his given name.